


shoddy igloos

by lategenocide



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: M/M, Slytherin!Donghyuck, architecture, donghyuck is a joyous imp, holiday break at hogwarts, mentioned triwizard tournament, mutual feelings pretty much, ravenclaw!renjun, renjun has an attitude problem, renjun smart, shoddy igloos, strangers to friends to lovers but lowkey, sunwoo as cannon fodder, writer shits on the wealth gap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-09
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:53:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28316313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lategenocide/pseuds/lategenocide
Summary: “Yo,” Donghyuck sat down across from Renjun with butterbeer in hand, a smile spreading across his mouth. Renjun glanced up from his own drink and the notebook laid out in front of him, filling with calculations and sketches. His writing hand was smeared with ink, the pen pressed against the paper.“That’s Seungmin’s seat,” Renjun replied.“But he’s not here right now, so humor me,” Donghyuck answered, leaning back with a sweep of his hand.( or some random slytherin named donghyuck suddenly sticks himself into renjun's life )
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Lee Donghyuck | Haechan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 90
Collections: NCTV Secret Santa 2020





	shoddy igloos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [haechan143](https://archiveofourown.org/users/haechan143/gifts).



> hellooo secret santa! i hope i did your prompt justice,,,, its been forever since i read hp, i had to look up hogsmeade i-

Renjun’s fourth year at Hogwarts was simultaneously the most ponderous yet eventful year, looking back.

For one, they ( as in, him, a Ravenclaw. Secretly, he wouldn’t have minded being sorted into Slytherin or Gryffindor- there was more a few instances where he wanted to murder someone with his bare hands, though if one considered it further, it would probably be his long list of ways to get away with said murder that made him a Ravenclaw. Renjun digressed. ) had Charms and double Herbology with Slytherin for the second year in a row. Renjun missed the time where whoever made their schedules had simply put them with the Hufflepuffs for the majority of their classes. That had been a simpler, much more bearable time.

For two, Renjun mused with a faint flash of fond annoyance, as Seungming shoved himself up against his side, the Triwizard Tournament season was here- that meant while he no longer had to listen to Seungmin’s long-suffering rants about how  _ hot _ Jisung looked in his red and gold keeper robes ( honestly, Seungming had some skewed priorities. The Ravenclaw versus Gryffindor matches had been an honest pain since the second year- Renjun wanted to smash their  _ stupid _ heads together, but he was pretty sure that was a big  _ no _ in the best friend manual. ), he, as the best friend, had to put up with Seungmin and Jisung’s awkward, long-distance pining. 

For three- “I still can’t believe Dejun got chosen for Drumstrang’s participant in the tournament,” Seungmin said, neatly broaching the subject for easy access. Ah, Xiao Dejun, Renjun’s not-crush. 

The latter snorted, “He’s already passed the first trial, why are you still in denial? Shouldn’t  _ I _ be?”

Seungming poked wordlessly at Renjun’s Yorkshire pudding, effectively stealing a smooth quarter of its flesh by putting it into his mouth, “I’m being in denial for you,” he replied. “He kept looking for you after he managed to get through the trolls, remember?” Renjun  _ did _ in fact remember that, watching Dejun scan the crowds of people immediately after he was done being scored. 

That had been about a month or so ago- winter break was on the verge of starting, but that didn’t mean anything of their professors were about to start reigning in the hours of homework they were assigned. As far as McGonagall was probably concerned, they’d be getting  _ more _ during the break. Renjun had no intention of going home this semester, just like the last three years. There was nothing to look forward to at home anyway. 

“It could’ve been anyone he was looking for,” Renjun sighed. “The schools have been surprisingly friendly with each other these days, he’d probably have friends from here. They even allow us to use pens instead of feathered quills. It’s called progress, Seungmin.”

“ _ Progress _ ,” a voice mocked. Renjun didn’t need to turn around to know it was a gang of Slytherins. It was Sunwoo and his mob of equally unintelligent sidekicks. “Only a mudblood could call it progress.”

“Shut up, Sunwoo,” Renjun sneered. “It’s not my fault your poor excuse of a head can barely differentiate between quill and pen, let alone mudbloods and half-bloods. You and your friends are the reason no one thinks too highly of old pureblood Slytherin families these days.”

Sunwoo bristled, “Whatever, at least I’m not the one stupidly parading my outside connections during the tournament.”

“I’m scared for my life, look how hard my hands are shaking,” Renjun mocked, holding up his steady hands. “Use up the rest of your depleting brain cells elsewhere, will you?” he made a dismissive gesture at Sunwoo, turning back to Seungmin with all of the energy of a mean girl. 

There was snickering. Renjun side-eyed the group, only to find a boy- skin sun-kissed bronze and glittering mischievous eyes- lingering behind with a smile. Sunwoo’s back was a rigid piece of petrified wood, and Renjun vaguely thought it quite looked like Malfoy. They were definitely cut out of the same cardstock, seemingly sturdy but flimsy under greater pressure. 

“I’m Donghyuck,” the Slytherin boy plopped himself down on the seat opposite of him, uninvited, a large, unfiltered smiling spreading over his face with the same sort of dark, fae-like glee Renjun would associate with some like Zhong Chenle. In other words, a Slytherin that was bearable as long as he was left alone and out of whatever they were cooking up. “I’ve seen you in my classes. Renjun right? I like you. It’s always fun to see you shoot Sunwoo down from his high horse.”

Renjun exchanged a quick look with Seungmin, who was pretending to mind his own business as he downed several pieces of buttered toast. 

“Glad to know I entertain you,” Renjun replied, short and dry. “Can I help you?” He eyed Donghyuck with a sharp, narrowed gaze. He distrusted anyone in Sunwoo’s vague friend group on principle. The hand on his fork tightened. 

Donghyuck threw up his hands, “Hey, hey, no need to get violent. I’ll see you around, Renjun!” he got up from his seat and disappeared before Renjun could decide whether or not to fork him anyway.

  
  
  


Donghyuck didn’t bother Renjun again for the rest of the week after that, safely leading Renjun to believe it would be a one time encounter. He promptly put it out of his mind a few hours later, more interested in keeping up his grades than a random Slytherin boy with a smile like an imp’s. It was not in fact a one-time encounter, to no one’s surprise except Renjun’s. 

He bumped into Donghyuck at Three Broomsticks, on the first day of winter break. 

“Yo,” Donghyuck sat down across from Renjun with butterbeer in hand, a smile spreading across his mouth. Renjun glanced up from his own drink and the notebook laid out in front of him, filling with calculations and sketches. His writing hand was smeared with ink, the pen pressed against the paper. 

“That’s Seungmin’s seat,” Renjun replied.

“But he’s not here right now, so humor me,” Donghyuck answered, leaning back with a sweep of his hand. Renjun scoffed, waving away his words. Donghyuck seemed to be undaunted by it and stuck around. 

Renjun scribbled unintelligible Mandarin into his notebook, “What do you want?” 

“Get to know you? Isn’t that obvious?” Donghyuck replied lazily. Renjun looked back up from his notes. Donghyuck didn’t look like he was here to cause trouble, but if Renjun had inherited anything from his mother, it was the trust issues under his skin. He stared blankly at him, all the while looking for any red flags of deceit. He couldn’t find any, but Renjun had always been a wary person. That, or it was trauma.

“I’m not interested,” he said finally, tearing his gaze away. 

Donghyuck pretended like he couldn’t hear, “Anyway, now that’s we’re best friends-”

“I never agreed to this.”

“- I need your height, birthday, favorite color, crush, and your entire life story, please,” Donghyuck leaned over the table, resting his head on the wooden top of it just so he could peer up at Renjun for a pitiful puppy look. Renjun stared back, unimpressed because his best friend was Kim Seungmin, and he had been subjected to enough of his puppy-eyed looks to build up an immunity to them ( not to mention,  _ Hyunjin _ . If Renjun would be ever-so-slightly weak to someone’s puppy eyes, it would probably be Hyunjin’s, much to Seungmin’s dismay. It couldn’t be helped, Hyunjin just had something about him ).

He jabbed a pen in the general direction of Donghyuck’s eyeballs, forcing the other party to withdraw from him in a fit of panic, “I think I said I never agreed to this. Now, please get out of Seungmin’s seat.”

Donghyuck slid into the next open seat at the table obediently, just in time for Seungmin to slid in the booth, Jisung, and Xiaojun in tow. Xiaojun pulled out the seat next to Renjun, while Jisung snagged an extra chair from an empty table nearby. 

Seungmin dropped into the seat Donghyuck had just vacated in order to avoid having his eyeball gauged out with a pen, “Why are you here?” he asked Donghyuck. 

Donghyuck raised his eyebrows, “Renjunnie invited me.”

“Don’t lie,” Renjun cut in without looking up from his notebook. 

  
  
  


So somehow, Donghyuck molded himself into their group by the time the visit to Hogsmeade ended. Xiaojun wasn’t exactly part of the original four of them ( Renjun, Seungmin, Jisung, and Hyunjin- Xiaojun was mainly just Renjun’s friend, but Seungmin had heard just about everything about him, so technically he was also Seungmin’s ), but Donghyuck also had no problem getting along with him either. Renjun would be envious at how easily he could get along with anyone if he wasn’t so against having to interact with people constantly. 

“Good morning, I hate Mcgonagall,” Donghyuck announced as he dropped into the couch next to Renjun, entering the Ravenclaw commons room without so much a hitch, right behind one of the other Ravenclaws. “Do you think I could like, Transfigure her into a pin cushion for a week or so? Because that is such a lovely idea, it’s tempting me.” He opened his binder of Transfiguration notes, looked at the wild scribbling, and almost decided to give up, then and there. 

“You’d get expelled,” Renjun said carelessly.

“There are bigger problems than that. The overpopulation of the entire world or the wealth gap, for example,” Donghyuck said lazily. He was right, technically. The human population was a problem, with advanced technology and medical expertise. Don’t even get Renjun started on the gap between the wealthy and the poor- it would end up in some angry rant that Seungmin had heard many times over. 

Renjun handed Donghyuck a pencil, “You won’t get your homework done if you just sit and complain,” he said. Donghyuck it from Renjun’s rasp, glancing over his shoulder at Renjun’s perfect handwriting. 

“If you say so, genius,” he scoffed. Renjun smacked him on the arm without looking up, making Donghyuck cry out in that overdramatic style he must’ve picked up from Hyunjin within the span of a week- or maybe he always had it in him, Renjun wouldn’t know.

“You wound me, Renjun,” Donghyuck drawls with extra effort, but he was smiling, so he had no reservations on how okay Donghyuck was. 

Renjun put a finger to Donghyuck’s temple, directing his head towards his homework, “Don’t cry to me before break ends asking to copy my homework.”

“Mean.”

  
  
  


The snow had piled up, blocked half of the ground floor doors with an overnight blizzard of white. Donghyuck trudged outside, a few hours behind Hagrid, Renjun trailing behind him. It was Christmas Eve, a day before all the presents would be piled at the foot of his bed and he had to wonder why his parent even bothered sending anything. 

“Renjun!” Donghyuck’s vice was muffled, probably covered by the mounds of snow, but when Renjun glanced around to find a hint of the human-sized imp, he could see no sign of him. It wasn’t until he felt a tugging on his arm, pulling him into a snow mound much bigger than Donghyuck. At first, snow rained down on him ( ha! ) but when his vision cleared, he was standing in a slightly cramped, slightly crude igloo of sorts, Donghyuck grinning in front of him.

For a second, Renjun thought it was beautiful- Donghyuck’s sun-touched skin glowed against the sheer white of the compacted snow walls, his eyes shining even half-hidden by his hood. For someone so avoidant of most human company, Renjun certainly adored Donghyuck’s liveliness an abnormal amount. And yet, it was just for a second, but even his heart skipped a beat. 

“What’d you think?” he asked, wiping off the snow from Renjun’s brown locks. “It’s nice, right?”

“Don’t ever go into architecture,” Renjun deadpanned. “There would be no safe buildings to live in.” he glanced at the tight space of the not-igloo, mentally mapping out how he could make it a little more sensible, totally ignoring Donghyuck’s half-hearted pout.

“Are you going to give me accurate calculations of how to make this a proper igloo?” Donghyuck asked jokingly, but to no one’s surprise but Donghyuck’s, Renjun did begin listing stats and marked out a basic layout onto the bumpy wall of the not-igloo. 

Donghyuck stared at Renjun with a little bit of awe and a little bit of fond exasperation, silent.

“What?” Renjun asked, snapping back to reality once he finished completely mapping out renovations to Donghyuck’spitiful not-igloo. 

Donghyuck laughed, shaking his head, “Nothing, you just amaze me.” 

Renjun rolled his eyes, rubbing away his plans for a mansion built from snow. He tugged at Donghyuck’s jacket, pulling both of them out of the space, “Wonderful. Now let’s get out of here, I think it’s going to collapse.” he ignored Donghyuck’s gasp of betrayal from behind him, his prediction came true just a minute later ( as his grandmother said, he had a crow’s mouth ).

  
  
  


He woke up on Christmas Day to a small pile of presents at the foot of his bed and a smiling Donghyuck hanging out on his bed, clearly waiting for him to wake up. 

“Merry Christmas!” Donghyuck completely ignored Renjun’s confused look, shoving his wrapped up gift into his hands. “I got this at Hogsmeade and Seungmin didn’t let me dig through your belongings so if you have this already, it’s not my fault.”

“Thanks…? Merry Christmas, Donghyuck,” Renjun said, still half deluded from sleep. “Did you get my present?”

“Yeah! I really needed a handbook on architecture, was dying for one,” he said, rolling his eyes. The smile on his face eliminated any hostile trace in his sarcasm. Renjun smiled, carefully picking apart the wrapping paper. It was a set of quills- Renjun wasn’t exactly a daily quill user, but he appreciated some of the benefits of using them, and a box of inks to go with it. The inks were all beautiful, each with their own quality pigmentation and an unearthly shimmer swirling in them. He recognized them as the ones he’d mentioned in passing when they all had window shopped.

“It’s lovely, Donghyuck,” Renjun picked up a quill, turning it over in his hands carefully. A small, delicate but pleased smile spread over his lips- reserved in his show of emotions, but Renjun was more interested in how Donghyuck remembered this small detail enough to go out and specifically spend the sort of money on him. 

Donghyuck grinned, brilliant and beautiful- Renjun caught the glow of sugar in his starry eyes- “I was hoping you’d like it. I’ll make sure to study your handbook and make a better igloo in the future,” he saluted mockingly with his last words, the impish smile on his face making Renjun’s breath catch. It wasn’t much, just Donghyuck being Donghyuck far too early on Christmas day, but it was just exactly that. For someone supposedly so smart with his words, Renjun suddenly couldn’t find the right ones to describe the helium in his chest.

“I’ll look forward to it,”’ he drawled, steadying his voice. He hoped Donghyuck would be too giddy over Christmas day to notice the faintly controlled breath, but Donghyuck’s head did the slightest of a knowing tilt, just enough for Renjun to wonder if he was obvious or if Donghyuck was just perceptive. 

  
  
  


They spent Christmas day piled up in the Gryiffdor common room ( Jisung had invited all of them ) after the Christmas banquet. There was still a long table of dessert in the common room, which Donghyuck would snap up every once in a while. The rest of the time, he spent playing with Renjun’s hair and cheerfully chatting away with Jisung and Hyunjin while Seungmin and Renjun did a theoretical renovation of the Hogwarts school. The school grounds however, were so complex with its history and magical setting that they kept disagreeing ( mostly playfully ) on how it should be respected. 

One particular time that Donghyuck was gone, heaping sugary pastries when Seungmin turned to Renjun, “Donghyuck seems to like you.”

Renjun hadn’t been expecting that- he nearly choked on the cap of his pen he was busy chewing to death, but Jisung had quick reflexes, and he gave Renjun’s back a few pounds and suddenly Renjun could breathe again.

“What?” he asked, disbelieving. “It’s just Donghyuck, he’s friendly with anyone.”

Seungming pounced, “I knew you’d be in denial- he doesn’t go around building shoddy igloos for just anyone, or wait for anyone to wake up on Christmas day so he can give them their gift personally. Also, he does his homework when you told him to,” Renjun personally thought an awfully carved out hole in the middle of Hagrid’s snow pile could barely count as an igloo, and maybe Renjun’s technique of simply ignoring Donghyuck until he did a reasonable of homework were just that effective, but he just could find an argument strong enough to counter the second one. He had already put that instance out of his mind, more interested in spending time with his friends than cryptic messages. 

“Sounds like one of your conspiracy theories,” Renjun said dismissively, eyeing the way Donghyuck was finished piling his plate with sweet pastries. Seungmin glanced in the direction that Renjun was looking at and immediately decided it was smarter to shut up for now. 

  
  
  


“Seungmin thinks you like me,” Renjun dropped the bomb two days after Christmas while he hung out with Donghyuck by the glass that separated the Slytherin dorms from the lake- Seungmin and Jisung were busy, scrambling to complete their homework, which they had put off for the first week. Donghyuck had been entertaining himself by tapping away at the glass, vainly hoping the octopus would emerge. With Renjun’s word’s, he paused, then turned away from the aquarium glass.

“He’s in Ravenclaw,” Donghyuck remarked. It seemed like two differing statements, but Renjun was also a Ravenclaw, and not for nothing. “Was that you two were discussing on Christmas?”

Adrenaline surged through Renjun’s chest as Donghyuck took a few steps closer. He hummed in agreement, “He’s perceptive sometimes.” 

“Sometimes,” Donghyuck laughed, wrapping his arms around Renjun’s shoulders from behind. “I think he’s more perceptive than you are.” 

“Shut up,” Renjun grumbled, amidst his racing heart. He poked Donghyuck in the cheek, gently venting his nonexistent anger. However, Donghyuck was faster than him- Renjun blamed it on the stars, or whatever god controlled reflexes- and caught him by wrist, gently redirecting his hand away, replacing the half-hearted aggression with a soft kiss to his lips.

“Never,” Donghyuck mumbled. Renjun scowled, looking closer to a huffy puppy than truly displeased, so Donghyuck simply kissed him again.

**Author's Note:**

> <3


End file.
